Editorial: Secrecy in child welfare system fails the powerless

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In the middle of a blinding snowstorm, an Edmonton Journal team drove west recently to visit the parents of a First Nations baby who died in care in 2011.

They were not welcomed.

The grieving parents only consented to see the reporter because she had the one thing the government had been denying them for two years.

She knew how their baby lost its life.

The reporter handed them a confidential four-page report, the room fell silent. The parents huddled together, poring over the scant details.

The system had taken away their daughter at birth, and never explained why. Two months later, she was dead and still the callous, dehumanizing silence continued. The parents were denied the autopsy report, the hospital records, all knowledge of the subsequent RCMP investigation.

Knowledge is power, after all, and these are some of the most powerless in our society.

By law, we cannot tell you their names. We cannot tell you their baby’s name.

But today, we can begin to tell you about the 145 children who have died in care in this province since 1999. It took four years and many thousands of dollars in legal bills for the Edmonton Journal to win the battle for these records.

We argued that the public has a right to know about the deaths of society’s most vulnerable and voiceless, so that the child welfare system could be held accountable. The Alberta government argued against the release of this information because, it claimed, the children and their families have a right to privacy.

A publication ban continues to prevent us from identifying the names and faces of these children. More egregiously, it continues to prevent the grieving parents of those children from uttering their dead child’s name in public.

Remember, we must all remember, those two parents we cannot name.

When the Journal finally won this legal battle last June — one in which only a sad and dismayed public could possibly claim victory — Alberta’s Information and Privacy Commissioner ruled that the need for public scrutiny outweighs some privacy protections.

And over the subsequent six-month investigation of these reports by the Journal and the Calgary Herald, many disturbing facts emerged.

The fact that nobody in government could even tell us, at first, how many children had died in care. The fact that the system is so cumbersome and convoluted that no one is accountable for these deaths. The fact that despite hundreds of well-meaning recommendations following fatality inquiries and internal investigations over the years, Albertans cannot see when or if they have been implemented.

Who knew? None of us, obviously.

It’s one of the oldest tricks in the book, using government secrecy and obfuscation to cover inaction, to hide incompetence.

The system has not just failed these children; it has failed us all.

Those involved in the child welfare system are society’s most vulnerable; often its least educated, its poorest, its most powerless. When the system fails them, as it did this blighted family, it is a call to action on the part of those who can and must demand change.

Over the next week, you will hear only the details the government has let us report. We have pursued this because we believe that knowledge is power.

We will remember — we must remember — that this is what it comes down to. Standing up, speaking up, for those who have no name.

Almost Done!

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